Simon Says... (Written by CEO Simon Anderson!)

December is a time to wish everyone happiness and good health. It's the
holidays after all. But I wonder if we wish that more because we NEED a
dose of happy and healthy this time of year, what with all the
obligatory family events and filling food!

Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy the holidays. Downtime and easy-going
social time is good for the body and soul. Life has rhythm for a reason,
and it's good to go with the flow of it.

One of the things I like most about the holidays is the time to reflect
on the last year, and plan afresh for the New Year.

On the personal front, I'll share that I want to build on my core
strength workouts I've been doing the last 3 months, and I've got some
refactoring to do on that given my last 2 weeks of excess.

On the DreamHost dimension, we've got some big ideas for 2014 that I
think you'll like, and they also relate to Core. We've put a lot of
smarts and effort the last 2 years into our new Cloud services,
DreamObjects and DreamCompute, as well as upgrading all of our
foundational infrastructure (data centers, network, servers, tech
operations).

Now we're ready for some big leaps forward with our Core systems and
software. We've got some great plans for upgrading our email system,
website and account backup, and a whole host of Core platform
improvements to save you time and make our services even easier to make
use of. Plus we have some sizzle on the way with expansion of DreamPress
managed WordPress, and a bunch of blazing fast speed related features I
can't talk about just now!

But back to you. From all of us at DreamHost, we wish you a very
entrepreneurial, innovative, prosperous and happy New Year. And don't
forget to dream - bigger!

Spend A Day With DreamHost!

There's just no easy way to say this so I'm gonna come right out with
it:

We love you.

There. I said it. Phew. It feels so good to finally get that off my
chest!

WE LOVE YOU!

Ha ha! I'm shoutin' it from the rooftops and I don't even care who
hears me! The world's gotta know!

We love you - that's a fact. But heyo, this long-distance Internet
relationship? It's not working out for us. At all.

Your profile pic? How do we even know that that's YOU?

What if, once we finally meet "IRL", there's no chemistry there?

These are questions that need answers, and we've got a surprise for you
that'll help make that happen - and soon!

We've been pulling double shifts over at the Buy 'N Large this holiday
season and we've finally got enough money saved up to do this thing
RIGHT!

We want to buy you a plane ticket to come hang out with us! We'll put
you up in a fancy hotel for a few nights, have you spend a day with the
DreamHost crew at our HQ, and we'll even treat you to a day out on the
town!

It's the best way we could think of to make sure that these feelings
we've got are real.

What's the catch? Well...we just want a little something in return.

It's nothing big - just some token reciprocity from you, preferably
professing your true feelings for us in the form of a short, PG-rated
music video!

That's all.

January 7th is the last day to enter, so if you've somehow managed to
avoid our advances on social media or our blog and this contest is news
to you, you'd best get crackin'!

NEW: WordPress 3.8

The new accelerated WordPress release schedule is no joke!

If it feels like 3.7 just came out...well, that's because it did - in
October!

Here we are just two months later and - BOOM. You've now got ONE TENTH
more version in your WordPress.

I hope you can handle it.

I barely can.

You see, I am not a smart man.

I am easily swayed by things that sparkle, lady perfumes, and all manner
of beautiful things. WordPress 3.8 drives me wilder than any previous
version of WordPress ever has because it looks, smells and feels like
the classiest content management system I have ever seen.

The most noticeable improvement in 3.8 is WordPress' new highly-
polished, subtly refined, administrative dashboard. It's got a fresh
new design with vector icons, a new font, improved contrast, and all-new
color schemes!

There are probably quite a few "under the hood, you'll probably never
notice 'em" performance improvements in 3.8 as well, but who cares!
Look how pretty this thing is! I just keep dialing my browser's font
size up and down like a carnival ride just to see what happens.
(Spoiler alert: I keep fainting.)

WordPress' new default theme, "Twenty Fourteen," launches with 3.8 as
well. I find it to be pretty pretty.

Visit the "One-Click Installer" section of your DreamHost control panel
to ensure you're running 3.8. If you haven't already been auto-upgraded, one click is all that stands between you and a date with
destiny!

If you're a DreamPress customer you're clearly a WordPress power user
and will no doubt expect that we've already upgraded you to 3.8 long
ago! And you would be right.

To jump on the DreamPress bandwagon and start enjoying the benefits of
a finely-tuned, purpose-built WordPress hosting experience from
DreamHost, you can upgrade any of your existing WordPress blogs with
just a clickeroo at:

DreamHost WTF: Invoices on Demand

The amount you pay us every year or month shouldn't come as a shock, but
we know how things can get.

Maybe you signed up for service a few years ago and have forgotten what,
exactly, you signed up for.

Maybe you're rich and never sweat the details! (Or you used to be...)

Maybe you just want a complete accounting of what you've been paying us,
what that cash has been paying for, and - oh yeah - you want that data
going all the way back to the day you first signed up with DreamHost or
you're GOING TO RAISE HELL WITH YOUR CREDIT CARD COMPANY!

...and you'll be able to generate a complete invoice for any period of
time during your stay with us. You'll be able to view a complete
accounting of any charges incurred with us and any payments you've made
to us.

You can even generate classy PDF invoices - just the type of thing to
shut your accountant up and give you one less thing to worry about as
you head into tax season!

GAAP RULES! No really - Generally Accepted Accounting Principles have
lots of rules for these kinds of things. Trust us, the invoices will
help.

We hate to talk money with friends... It's tacky. So we'll stop here.

DHSOTMs

The DreamHost Site Of The Month is a coveted title reserved for a select
few DreamHost customers who have wowed their peers with incredible feats
of wonder perpetrated from behind a keyboard - maybe in a parent's
basement, maybe not.

As voted by YOU, the winner from NOVEMBER in the CONTENT, DESIGN,
STRUCTURE, ORIGINALITY, AND OVERALL categories (a clean sweep!) is:
Rogue Valley Symphony
"The Rogue Valley Symphony is committed to bringing great performances
of live classical music to everyone living and visiting the communities
of Southern Oregon and Northern California."

I think it's noble that all you rogues from the valley decided to turn
over a new leaf and get classy with the musics.

Remember, you can always click through to the "DreamHost Site Of The Month" section of your account
control panel at any time to submit your own site(s), vote on candidates, and
view all winners past and present.